British semiconductor and software major Arm unveiled its new computing solutions to accelerate autonomous decision-making with safety capability across automotive and industrial applications. The new suite of IP includes the Arm Cortex-A78AE CPU, Arm Mali-G78AE GPU, and Arm Mali-C71AE ISP, which it says is engineered to work together in combination with supporting software, tools and system IP to enable silicon providers and OEMs to design for autonomous workloads.

The semiconductor company says the new solutions will offer a step change in compute for autonomous systems in automotive and industrial automation, which Arm believes will be an $8 billion (Rs 59,208 crore) silicon opportunity in 2030.

Designed with safety first the Arm Cortex-A78AE is its highest performance CPU with safety, Arm Mali-G78AE is Arm’s first safety capable GPU, and Arm Mali-C71AE enables safety for vision use cases. The new IP enables solutions for autonomous applications, supported by the Arm ecosystem, software and tools, Safety Ready technology, System IP and Physical IP.

The new solutions are engineered to work together in combination with supporting software, tools and system IP to enable silicon providers and OEMs to design for autonomous workloads. These products will be deployed in a range of applications, from enabling more intelligence and configurability in smart manufacturing to enhancing ADAS and digital cockpit applications in automotive.

Chet Babla, VP – Automotive and IoT Line of Business, Arm said: “Autonomy has the potential to improve every aspect of our lives, but only if built on a safe and secure computing foundation. As autonomous decision-making becomes more pervasive, Arm has designed a unique suite of technology that prioritizes safety while delivering highly scalable, power efficient compute to enable autonomous decision-making across new automotive and industrial opportunities.”

Enabling autonomous software ecosystem
As autonomous systems move towards more software-defined functionality, Arm says it is working to accelerate the development of software that will fully realise the benefits of these new technologies through initiatives such as Project Cassini, aimed at laying the foundation for the adoption of cloud native software paradigms across the entirety of edge computing. It is also working with multiple open source communities and specialist software vendors to widely enable the autonomous software ecosystem, adopting innovations from the established cloud native ecosystem, and collaboratively driving new development to support the features required for autonomous workloads.

Laszlo Kishonti, CEO, AImotive, “As a leader in AI-based automotive software, we are collaborating closely with Arm on software solutions for ADAS and autonomous driving. We are excited to see this next generation of Arm’s safety-engineered IP, helping deliver more deployable automated driving solutions and provide the foundational compute required for future automotive systems.”.

Michael Wagner, director – Competence Center Control Technology, KUKA: “The future of smart manufacturing requires innovative automation solutions with compute capabilities that support the safe, flexible and seamless operation of factories. The Arm architecture is already powering some of our key industrial solutions, and we see Arm’s new technologies as a positive step towards enabling the safety and further development of robotics needed for industrial operations to move closer to true autonomy.”

Gary Hicok, senior VP –hardware development, Nvidia: “Powerful new processing capabilities are needed to enable future autonomous vehicles and machines. As a lead partner for the new Arm Cortex-A78AE, Nvidia delivers the advanced performance and safety these edge AI systems require with our next-generation Nvidia Orin SoC.”

Alexander Hitzinger, senior VP –autonomous driving at Volkswagen Group and CEO, Artemis: “The requirements for higher level of driver automation, electrification and immersive in-vehicle experiences are continually growing, and scalable, heterogenous, safe compute is critical in order to meet the requirements of future vehicle electronics systems. Innovation such as Arm’s new technologies and the extensive ecosystem that supports it will help to accelerate the deployment of next-generation vehicles.”